Please Please Please lobby your MHK for Change

[offshoremanxman]

33 minutes ago, Non-Believer said:

It's been going on a lot longer than Covid although that has certainly had an adverse impact.

It’s Covid and Brexit. Brexit has moved the City of London back to about 1992 when it crashed out of the ERM. 

[Non-Believer]

11 minutes ago, Roxanne said:

I would suggest it’s been going on for time immemorial. 

Fair one but let's say that it has certainly accelerated in the last 40 years, certainly as far as UK goes. CEOs and their management and accountancy hierarchies are paid huge US-style bonuses and incentives to maximise revenue within regulations and laughable competition parameters and reduce staff costs both in staff numbers and pay - and all for the benefit of who? Largely the already wealthy shareholding classes.

It's an accelerating wealth transfer but politically it's unfashionable and dangerous to question it.

[code99]

Aside from global issues, the Island faces its own very specific challenges:

What about the strong likelihood that the details of Dr Ranson’s case would never have made it into public domain if she had not had a mighty (political, moral and financial) support of the BMA? Which begs the question – are there any other whistle-blower cases lurking behind closed doors that are being kept hidden from public view (e.g., that the ‘complainants’ do not have sufficient money to move their cases into the glare of the public’s view)?

The IOM Covid Review has been frustrated by the delays in receiving the relevant documents. Chris Robertshaw, in his interview with Zandra Lewis, stated that for the past 3 years in Tynwald anything regarding Abbotswood has been sub-judice. Throughout this period the public was ‘kept in the dark’. If our ‘Honourable Members’ are being ‘kept in the dark’, and are legally not permitted to debate/ discuss significant stuff, then inevitably they resort to asking banal questions e.g., they might ask about the friskiness of seagulls, or to saying nothing at all. Undoubtedly some MHKs are doing very little to justify the money being bestowed on them by the taxpayers.

Whilst the Island desperately needs front line workers in both the public sector, and the private sector, our layers of senior civil servants have bulged grotesquely out of proportion to the Island’s population. I envisage that certain roles and even departments could have been merged, rationalised or even abolished altogether. However, the IOMG persists with the recruitment of managers upon managers – at the same time, the IOMG keeps on failing to employ subject-matter-experts with practical knowledge and experience, as opposed to employing some gormless clowns whose incompetency is costing the Island a fortune. The public are getting the latest ‘progress updates’ about Liverpool Dock not from the IOMG, but instead from a bloke with a drone (posted on another MF threat). Perhaps he could estimate the cost of the whole project, since no one in DOI/ IOMG seems able to do so?

The largest industry on this Island is the business of Government. The IOMG appears to be wedded to the strategy that our well-paid civil servants are what is keeping our economy ‘vibrant’. The problem with this ‘strategy’ is that it will only work while there is sufficient money in the Reserves to support it. Currently, the IOMG spends more that it receives in income (the IOMG has budgeted to spend this year £150m more than it will earn) - this cannot go on indefinitely. The large chunk of the IOM Reserves is the National Insurance Fund. Presumably, some ‘Honourable Members’ will nod through additional ‘dipping’ into this Fund to pay for the escalating costs of running the IOMG.

I have not seen the most recent Actuarial Forecast to determine when the good times are likely to end but, IMHO, until the Island’s public finances go belly up any political changes for the better will sadly be negligible.

I genuinely would love to be wrong about all of this.

[woolley]

1 hour ago, offshoremanxman said:

It’s Covid and Brexit. Brexit has moved the City of London back to about 1992 when it crashed out of the ERM. 

Where do you get this stuff from? It just isn't true.

https://www.theglobalcity.uk/resources/state-of-the-sector-2023

Covid had a temporary effect. Brexit just some shifting around of activities, but the City is still growing. The City didn't crash out of the ERM. Sterling did, and it set the UK off on 15 years of continuous growth.

[woolley]

20 hours ago, offshoremanxman said:

I’m not sure I am missing the point because nothing tangibly seems to be happening. It’s not even worth following local politics at the moment as literally nothing is happening. We go £50M over at least on Liverpool .. oh well nobody says anything. Not even you. The airport isn’t functioning businesses are concerned about the IOMs reputation .. oh well who cares nobody really says anything. A survey says that 93% of the population have absolutely no faith in IOM Governments strategy .. oh well who gives a shit nothing said. Manx Care can’t cope .. oh well who gives a toss. Then Moorhouse asks a question about how many bottles of water were sold at schools last TT Week. It’s an unbelievably embarrassing shit-show. It’s not like we don’t have some decent MHKs (I wouldn’t exclude you from that category either) but honestly what the f**k are any of them actually doing about anything? It speaks volumes that one of the main voices of decent currently calling for change is Callister - a complete whopper of a granny farmer who would be out of his depth in a puddle. But at least to be fair is voicing some descent and calling for change in the way things are being run when you don’t hear a peep out of anyone else. 

@Stu Peters I think he has a point, Stu. I know you say you prefer to work for change behind the scenes, but nobody can know what you are doing to that end if you don't tell us. What do you have to lose at this stage by rattling a few cages publicly? If it puts some noses out of joint, so what? You wanted to be in the position to make a difference. This is your chance.

[woolley]

3 hours ago, Roxanne said:

Shareholders delighted, customers freeze through winter.

And still we just accept it. 

Most of the people who damn shareholders are actually shareholders themselves through their pensions. The market rules need to change though, I agree.

[boswellian]

12 hours ago, Malik said:

Out of interest how many of the island’s electorate do you believe reads this forum? I have tried to gauge it by monitoring the ‘who’s online’ stat at the bottom of the home page. It rarely tops 300 and quite a few of the active posters sound like they live off island. It also makes sense to me the ‘guests’ browsing will more or less be the same people. Overall, I doubt you are speaking to more than 300 of the islands 85,000 population, how can so few force a change? Less of the population will probably vote at the next election but even that won’t provoke a change.

True. But you have to start somewhere. How do we take it further? Fb? Telegram? Twitter? Increases the readership perhaps, but in the end will it result in action? Perhaps it needs a dedicated group. Obviously not Mec Vannin these days. PAG? 
 

This is the big question. How do you get people to actually take an interest and take action about local affairs? Apathy is rampant, and also understandable to some extent. If the public feels that they are not taken seriously then action seems futile. Aim achieved? 

[Stu Peters]

5 hours ago, Declan said:

Wasn’t that the basis of your manifesto?

And that’s exactly why I volunteered for roads and the airport within DOI, the two areas I might be able to make a difference in. I challenge things all the time, but don’t use the media or chambers to ask questions to prove how worthy I am.

Politics can either be work or showbiz. You know what I think of virtue signalling.

[Declan]

12 minutes ago, Stu Peters said:

And that’s exactly why I volunteered for roads and the airport within DOI, the two areas I might be able to make a difference in. I challenge things all the time, but don’t use the media or chambers to ask questions to prove how worthy I am.

Politics can either be work or showbiz. You know what I think of virtue signalling.

Woosh!

You do realise you are one of the most virtue-signalling posters on here? 

[Moghrey Mie]

48 minutes ago, boswellian said:

True. But you have to start somewhere. How do we take it further? Fb? Telegram? Twitter? Increases the readership perhaps, but in the end will it result in action? Perhaps it needs a dedicated group. Obviously not Mec Vannin these days. PAG? 
 

This is the big question. How do you get people to actually take an interest and take action about local affairs? Apathy is rampant, and also understandable to some extent. If the public feels that they are not taken seriously then action seems futile. Aim achieved? 

I think one of the aims of PAG (Positive Action Group) is to encourage people to take an interest in local politics on the Isle of Man. Their meetings have been well attended but it seems to be difficult to get younger people on the committee to organise events.

[Jarndyce]

3 hours ago, code99 said:

Which begs the question – are there any other whistle-blower cases lurking behind closed doors that are being kept hidden from public view (e.g., that the ‘complainants’ do not have sufficient money to move their cases into the glare of the public’s view)?

No question - of course there are!

[Shake me up Judy]

52 minutes ago, Stu Peters said:

And that’s exactly why I volunteered for roads and the airport within DOI, the two areas I might be able to make a difference in. I challenge things all the time, but don’t use the media or chambers to ask questions to prove how worthy I am.

Politics can either be work or showbiz. You know what I think of virtue signalling.

You at least have to be seen to be doing something Stu. That's not grandstanding. Tin helmet politics won't get you the respect of the electorate and you've been too quiet while the Island is being rocked by major issues. A lot of us were willing to give you support but it hasn't been repaid so far. 

[Stu Peters]

2 hours ago, Declan said:

Woosh!

You do realise you are one of the most virtue-signalling posters on here? 

I think I'm pretty self-aware, certainly in terms of my limitations and faults, but I never thought that was one of them. I shall reflect on this.

1 hour ago, Shake me up Judy said:

You at least have to be seen to be doing something Stu. That's not grandstanding. Tin helmet politics won't get you the respect of the electorate and you've been too quiet while the Island is being rocked by major issues. A lot of us were willing to give you support but it hasn't been repaid so far. 

Point taken SMUJ. It's not the way I see it, but I respect your opinion.

[boswellian]

23 hours ago, Moghrey Mie said:

I think one of the aims of PAG (Positive Action Group) is to encourage people to take an interest in local politics on the Isle of Man. Their meetings have been well attended but it seems to be difficult to get younger people on the committee to organise events.

Yes, I agree. But I think that is the point. How to get younger people involved? Although even the older generation can be quite apathetic. Pose a challenging question about political matters and they simply can’t be bothered to consider it. 

[manxman1980]

8 hours ago, boswellian said:

Yes, I agree. But I think that is the point. How to get younger people involved? Although even the older generation can be quite apathetic. Pose a challenging question about political matters and they simply can’t be bothered to consider it. 

The problem isn't the young.   It's the elderly who continue to vote in people who only have a short term focus.  

The older generations should stop being selfish and start thinking of the people who will follow.